Namibia ranked least attractive investment destination

RMB South Africa has controversially ranked Namibia as one of the least favourable investment destination in a research study conducted amongst 20 sub-Saharan African countries.Presenting a research paper entitled “Where to Invest in Africa”, Celeste Fauconnier, a research analyst at RMB South Africa said Namibia was the 15th best country to invest in out of 20 countries in sub Saharan Africa.Namibia scored 3.0 points while the lowest ranked country, Malawi scored 2.7 points. South Africa was ranked as the best country to invest in in sub-Saharan Africa with a score of 5.6 followed by Nigeria (4.9), Ghana (4.4), Ethiopia (4.3) and Tanzania (3.9 points ) completing the top five countries to invest in.Commenting on the research, economist Daniel Motinga said although he understands the methodology used in the research, he somehow disagreed with the findings of the research. He said: “I think the presentation by my colleague Celeste simply highlighted the market size challenges in Namibia. We have a small population size and therefore Namibia is not seen as offering renewed growth opportunities.“It has the characteristics of a mature economy. Having said that, I think Namibia should score relatively well overall because of the stable and predictable macro-economic and political environment. The mining project pipeline also favours Namibia.”On scoring the top 20 countries to invest in in sub-Saharan Africa, Fauconnier looked at three factors: market size, market growth and the operational environment.Interestingly, Botswana a country with a population almost the same as Namibia was ranked 6th despite the researchers saying market size was one of the main factors influencing a country’s position on the list.